Llandudno in the wind

Great start to the morning at Y Promenâd parkrun just down the coast from Llandudno at Llandrillo-yn-Rhos.

Slow relaxed start from me, but then I actually had to get up and dawdle round the beautiful course.

It was lovely to see Susan and Paul there too, and of course, we all collected the Y parkrun too.

We then headed off in opposite directions, they went Rhyl in their warm and dry car, and we went back to Llandudno on our trusty machines.

When we reached the far end of Llandudno Promenade the battery ran out on my bike, and at exactly that moment a huge storm roared towards us.

Daz cycled slowly on into the face of it, and I pedalled as hard as I can could but barely moved. We were buffeted from side to side too, and hit in the face with stinging rain or hail.

Eventually and bedraggled, we reached our hotel and then a couple of minutes later the wind dropped and the sun came out again.

Honestly, that's all true, and not exaggerated at all.

In the afternoon the wind was still really, really strong and we had coffee at the end of the pier.

Great views, and unfortunately the wind is invisible, so you will have to take my word for it.

It didn't spoil our day either, just made it more interesting and memorable.

Wrexham to Llandudno

Epic cycle day today covering 89 kilometres and over 800 metres of climbing. 

We set off from Wrexham and over the lumps and bumps of the Clwydian Range. I had never heard of it before, and there was no quick way around it, so we had to go over it.

I am very glad we did because it was a beautiful route and once at the top, we had an almost endless glide down the other side.

We stopped for refreshments at a café in Ruthin and I ate the biggest iced bun that I have ever seen. I was going to save half for later, but before I knew what had happened it was all gone.

It was then about 30 kilometres to the coast at Rhyl. I don't know if we missed the highlights of Rhyl, but it didn't look good so we pressed quickly on.

The pedestrian bridge in the shape of a sailing ship was pretty good though.

We hugged the north coast of Wales following Sustrans route 5 all the way to Llandudno with the weather gradually improving, and by the time we got to Colwyn Bay it was lovely.

Just a few kilometres from our target we passed a Mr Whippy van, and this time I polished off the biggest 99 ever.

Happy days.

Telford to Wrexham

 In the style of the Tour de France, we had a rest day yesterday, and I spent the whole day just lying around and relaxing.

Today we set off from Telford to cycle to Shrewsbury. 

It took a while to find the start of the route, but eventually we found a lift on this bridge that took us down to the road below and we were on our way. 

For about the first time ever, it all seemed to be downhill and we glided down to Shrewsbury. We had time to have a look around, although it was full of cars and not very exciting, and then we bumped the bikes down lots of steps to the train station.

We caught a train to a little place called Chirk, which is right next to the Shropshire Union Canal. Within two minutes we were on the tow path, and a few minutes later we reached the Whitehouse Canal Tunnel.

It was exciting , atmospheric, long and dark, and when we got to the other end it raining. Welcome to Wales we thought. 

The wind was picking up too as we approached the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct.

It is another amazing piece of engineering dating back to the Industrial Revolution.

With a big link to the start of our trip today, the Aqueduct was designed by Thomas Telford and completed in 1805. It is a 307 metre long cast iron trough that is 38 metres above the River Dee, and is the longest and highest in the world.

Me and my lovely bike felt every metre of that height and distance, and were very relieved to reach the other side.

Our journey then carried on without any more scares to Wrexham, home of the newly and multiply promoted Wrexham Athletic Football Club.

There is a lot of building work going on as a massive new stand is being created.

We took a nice stroll around the town and it had a nice flock of concrete sheep scattered all around, a pretty church and a café with excellent scones.

Ludlow to Telford

 Today we wimped out a bit and reduced what was going to be a giant ride down to a more reasonable size by catching a train part of the way to Ludlow.

We set off from the station and could see high hills on the horizon, and for the next hour we battled up an enormous one, and straight into a headwind.

It's true that our ebikes took some of the strain, but it was good to get to the top, and most of the rest of the day seemed pleasantly downhill, or certainly easier.

The exception was Bridgnorth where we stopped for coffee. Up another really steep hill, and then down again just as quickly. 

From there we cycled alongside the lovely River Severn towards the Ironbridge Gorge, and parked our bikes right in the middle of the famous bridge.

The bridge was the first in the world to be cast in Iron in 1779. After that cast iron became widely used in bridges, buildings and aquaducts and it was a trailblazer for the Industrial Revolution.

We reluctantly left it behind and climbed yet again, using the very last of the juice left in the batteries on our bikes.

We are staying in Telford which is a strange place with no town centre, just large out of town shopping areas. Our hotel seems like it is on the outskirts of it.

However, on consulting the internet it says that Telford Town Centre was developed in the late 1960s and early 70s as a new town, and the Telford Centre was originally a massive indoor mall.

It is now surrounded by a Town Park and our hotel is actually right in the centre of it all!

Gloucester to Hereford

 Our morning started with an early walk around Gloucester, and what an unexpected treat this turned out to be.

We started at the docks just around the corner from our hotel. It is a mix of old dockside life, and modern apartments, shops and restaurants.

We arrived just in time to see a boat go through the huge lock, then under a swing bridge and out on to the river Severn.

Walking away from the docks we quickly found the stunning Cathedral.

Nestled behind the Cathedral in a square surrounded by modern houses was an imposing statue of John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester. It is in the exact same spot where he was burnt at the stake on the orders of Mary Tudor in 1555 for not recanting his religion.

In the town itself we found Baker's Clock. We didn't know anything about it and wondered if it chimed. We went back, but just after 10am didn't see or hear anything.

But reading about it now and being 40 miles away, it turns out that the bells are struck every 15 minutes. It's almost worth going back to see it.

All this adventure and we haven't even had breakfast or started our ride.

Yet again the ride was good, lots of quiet lanes and pretty countryside.

Lunch was on a sunny bench at Newent, and the bikes got a break leaning against a lovely building.

Hereford was good, but didn't really compare to Gloucester. Our hotel was right next door to Hereford football club and they were playing Merthyr Town as we arrived. They won three nil, but a quick check of the table shows that they lost the previous four matches and are in the relegation zone.

Highlights of the town was the views of the River Wye, a giant bull statue in the town centre, and a sculpture of Edward Elgar leaning against his bicycle. It does look as if Daz is trying to strangle him, but that was accidental.

Bath to Gloucester

The panniers are packed, the electric bikes are out and we are off on a journey. The first leg was from Bath to Gloucester and the sun was out.

It was Easter Sunday so the steam train at Bitton was getting ready for an outing.

Unusually for a bank holiday the sun was out, although it compensated with a cold wind that kept our coats on all day.

The shops were all shut too, but we found a little corner shop in a lovely village and sat on a sunny bench for a lunch of coconut macaroons.

Almost the whole journey was on cycle paths and quiet country lanes with beautiful scenery.

The best photo of the day competition was won by Daz with this shot of his bike resting on the Splatt Swing Bridge over the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal.

We were surprised to find such a huge canal so close to the Severn Estuary, so I looked it up and found out that the canal was opened in 1827.

It was one of the widest and deepest canals in the world, was 17 miles long and provided the very important docks at Gloucester with a safe passage to the Estuary, that avoided the dangerous tides and rapids in the river Severn.